


Wanted

by wocket



Category: Real Person Fiction, dylric - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Depression, Dylric, Fugitives, M/M, Road Trips, Underage Sex, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 07:50:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20060551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wocket/pseuds/wocket
Summary: April 20, 1999. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold don't kill themselves in the library. Instead - they run.





	Wanted

“Are you with me?”

Amid adrenaline thrumming, Eric does the unexpected, the unthinkable: Eric fists a hand in the collar of Dylan’s WRATH t-shirt and kisses him on the mouth in the empty hallway outside the library at Columbine High School. _This_ wasn’t in any of their plans.

Stunned, Dylan falls into the kiss without resistance, his body alight with his first kill, his first kiss.

Dylan’s answer is as clear as a bell: “I’m with you.”

*

The terror in the library ends at 11:36 AM.

Eric lays down his weapons, pulls on a flannel shirt and steals a white baseball cap that’s been abandoned by a jock. “Ugh,” he says, disgusted just to touch a white hat.

“I hate looking at you like that,” Dylan tells him. He lines up his TEC-9 and double-barreled shotgun neatly on a table and begins removing his gear. Stripping his glove from his left hand, he thinks about leaving it with the guns before sentimentally tucking it into his back pocket. It was something he had shared with Eric; they’d split one pair of gloves after Dylan pointed out they’d only need one of each since he was left-handed.

“The hat’s just until we get to the car,” Eric promises. Eric left his gray Prelude parked in Clement Park earlier this morning before meeting up with Dylan in the senior parking lot. All they need to do to make it off campus is to follow the other evacuating students and exit the school to the north, blending in with dozens of frantic teenagers.

Dylan tucks his own baseball cap into his pocket with the glove. While Eric had a shot at blending in with the rest of the student body, there wasn’t much that could be done about his own appearance - his height gave him away easily.

They would need to be fast.

*

It’s less than half a mile from Columbine High School to the parking space in Clement Park where Eric’s car is waiting. The walk has never felt longer. The two boys exit via the art room hallway and hustle through the smoker’s pit, toward the park. A group of girls runs past them, frenzied, terrified. Eric and Dylan keep on.

The sound of sirens gives Dylan pause. Eric grabs his elbow to steady him and makes him keep walking as they try not to bring attention to themselves.

It seems like they hold their breath the entire way to Clement Park; they’re still trying to catch their breaths when they clamor into the Prelude and lock the doors. Eric ditches the white baseball cap before starting the engine and following a line of other vehicles out onto Pierce Street.

Dylan keeps his eyes peeled for police as Eric navigates the first careful steps of their getaway. The two of them had spent many a late night discussing escape routes out of Colorado. Instead of heading south to New Mexico, they’d go due east toward Kansas, and then make their way across the middle of the United States and down into the South. To Miami. From there… well, they were still working that part out.

The two of them would have to rely on each other now - completely.

*

It takes over two hours to get out of the state to the Kansas border, but even that marks a one-upping of Timothy McVeigh's getaway. Kansas consists of nothing but rolling fields and farms. It feels empty but Klebold and Harris are desperate to go somewhere, anywhere.

Eric drives the speed limit, keeping the car just under 70mph, careful not to bring too much extra attention to their vehicle.

The wind tosses Dylan’s hair every time he rolls down the window for a cigarette. The boys don’t speak or turn on the radio. All they can do is look ahead, counting the miles.

*

“We need to ditch my car,” Eric decides once they cross into Missouri six hours later.

_It’s probably a good idea_, Dylan admits to himself. The Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office is bound to have figured out the identities of the perpetrators of the violent attack at Columbine; driving around with a license plate registered to Eric Harris is as good as having a target painted on their back.

Eric drives until he sees a run-down sign that says WE PAY CASH FOR CARS. He pulls into the lot, eyeing a black Toyota pick-up truck, but Dylan convinces him to go with a nondescript white Oldsmobile. It’ll be easier to store their stuff - however little there is - in a car with a trunk, he reasons, and while he is too tall to curl up comfortably in the backseat, there might be enough room for Eric to do so while Dylan’s taking a shift driving.

Half an hour later, they’re driving off the lot in a used car and leaving the Prelude in the rearview mirror.

*

The boys keep up a steady pace on the road day after day. The flat, endless plains of Kansas and Missouri give way to the rolling hills and green foliage of Tennessee. The highways are dotted with wild violets and black-eyed Susans.

Eric finally hands over the car keys to Dylan, who takes his turn driving happily. Eric fidgets with the radio constantly while Dylan switches lanes often, passing eighteen-wheelers and RVs.

Ten miles after they stop at a rest stop to piss, Dylan notices a state trooper trailing behind them. Dylan’s hands tighten on the steering wheel. He keeps an eye on the other car in the rearview mirror. It’s hard to bury his paranoia.

“Reb,” Dylan calls out after watching the patrol car for a few miles.

“I know,” he answers. “I’m watching.”

“You think he’s following us?”

“Dunno,” Eric responds. “Hard to tell.”

The trooper throws on his lights, and Dylan starts to panic. “_Reb_ -”

“Keep driving.”

Dylan sucks in a deep breath of air but keeps on. His heart is pounding. _We’re fucked_, he thinks as the state trooper speeds up behind them and starts to get closer. He grips the steering wheel, knuckles turning white.

“Keep driving,” Eric repeats, voice low.

Dylan starts to decelerate but before he can turn the car onto the shoulder, the state trooper merges into the left lane, pulling ahead of them and zipping off the highway at the next exit.

Both of them release a heavy sigh.

*

Eric drives until he can’t keep his eyes on the road anymore, too keyed up to let Dylan take another shift at the wheel. It seems like there’s no way to put Littleton behind them fast enough. One hour on the road turns into two and two turns into twenty. They eventually stop in southern Tennessee at a shitty roadside motel. An old VACANCY sign swings above the lobby, almost Lynchian by design.

Dylan waits in their Oldsmobile while Eric pays for the room. For now it was best not to be seen together, not so soon after the incident. Their faces are spread all over the news and soon it would be newspapers, magazines, tabloids. It would do them good to avoid being caught side by side.

Their room - number 13 - is the very last room on the far end of the skinny building. A blanket of kudzu creeps over the nearby plants and telephone poles, threatening to take over the motel itself.

Inside, Eric leans his forehead against the door with a sigh and latches the chain behind them.

Dylan claims one of the beds and disappears into the bathroom immediately.

The bathroom sink switches on, and Eric hears water flow for a solid five minutes. After noticing the tap running constantly a few minutes after that, he decides he’s curious. He pushes the door open with his index finger to check on Dylan. He finds him still fully dressed sitting on the toilet lid, staring at his hands.

“V?”

Dylan doesn’t look up when Eric calls his name. He seems kind of out of it, obsessed on the blood streaking his skin. Yesterday’s affair is still with them. They haven’t exactly had time for a good scrub. Eric is surprised they look this… normal. If you can call it that.

Eric grabs a washcloth and dips it under the faucet, soaking it in the warm water.

Standing in front of Dylan in the smallest bathroom he’s ever seen, he works the wet washcloth over the skin of his hands, wiping the dried flecks of blood away for him. He slides the washcloth over Dylan’s knuckles, between his fingers, across the inside of his pale wrist. Eric scrubs gently until Dylan’s hands are wiped clean.

Eric takes a second to look at his best friend. He looks so _tired_, maybe more exhausted than Eric’s ever seen him. There’s a streak of blood on Dylan’s jaw that he missed earlier. He presses the washcloth to Dylan’s cheek and wipes until the rag comes away clean.

After a quiet moment, Dylan’s long, skinny arms come up to wind around Eric. Dylan presses his cheek against Eric’s abdomen.

Eric sets the washcloth down on the countertop but he doesn’t move away from Dylan, doesn’t leave the room, even though this isn’t something they _do_. This closeness is new, but neither one could deny that’s what they are now, closer somehow. Their deeds on April 20 have brought them together to be inextricably linked forever.

*

Life on the road becomes repetitive quickly, and cash dwindles faster than expected. Eric decides he’s going to do something about it, although he won’t tell Dylan his idea. Dylan gets upset and goes on some kind of a rant about being equals, but Eric storms out before he can get very far.

Eric returns to their hotel room later that night, trudging through the door wordlessly and handing Dylan a thick stack of cash. It must be a couple hundred bucks at least. Dylan’s jaw drops.

“What did you do?”

Eric ignores his question. Dylan ought to be grateful, not annoyed.

Dylan watches as Eric empties his pockets, placing a bottle of booze and his 9mm SIG-Sauer handgun on the dresser beside the television set.

“What the fuck did you do?”

Eric turns and crosses his arms, leaning against the dresser. “I did what I had to do.”

“How’d you get the cash, Reb?”

“You know how,” Eric tells him, confirming the sinking feeling Dylan has that Eric held up some convenience store somewhere. As many nights as Eric and Dylan had spent planning, there were gaps in their scheme. While their plans for the bombing were thorough, they hadn’t considered some of the details regarding the aftermath: fake identification, passports, reliable income. While they had set aside a considerable amount prior to the shooting, they were burning through funds faster than expected.

Dylan runs a hand through his hair, clearly bothered. “Fuck. Fuck!”

“This is why I didn’t tell you.”

“Are you kidding me?” Standing up and berating Eric, Dylan gets a glimpse of the other items Eric lifted from the gas station. The worst of it all is a TIME magazine with their fucking faces on it. “This is the kind of fucked up shit that will get us caught.” _What a risky fucking move_, Dylan thinks. “This is not a good idea.”

Eric shoves Dylan, upset that he’s looming over him. “Don’t tell me what to do.”

Dylan’s anger flares, and then all at once, it goes out like a light. His body sags and he sits on the end of the bed, face in his hands.

A minute or two later, Dylan feels the bed dip beside him. Eric screws the cap off of the vodka, passing Dylan the bottle.

Dylan accepts, taking a long swig.

They’re quiet for a long time before Dylan speaks.

“I don’t want to fight.” He takes a deep breath, like he’s choosing his words carefully. “You’re all I’ve got.” He passes the vodka back to Eric, unable to look at him.

Eric takes a few long swigs.

“I’ve got your back, Vodka,” It’s always felt like it’s been the two of them against the world, but now more than ever. “You don’t trust me?”

Dylan doesn’t know how Eric could ever imply that. That was _all_ they had now. His next words are low and quiet. “I’d be really fucked up if something happened to you. That’s all.”

Eric starts to see where Dylan’s coming from - it’s not what he expected. Eric takes an equally deep drink of vodka for solidarity, an unspoken pact.

“Okay.”

On empty stomachs, the vodka goes a long way. Dylan and Eric share the bottle until it’s gone.

It feels good to get hammered.

*

Both of them nurse hangovers the next morning. The rain pounding on the car windows intensifies the pounding in their heads.

When the rain doesn’t stop, Dylan pulls over at a Piggly Wiggly for supplies. It’s a welcome respite from the weather and the monotony of staring at the scenery. Dylan’s afraid to spend too much money, so it’s mostly Eric dropping things in their shopping basket. Slim Jims. Pringles. Sunflower seeds and salted peanuts. Extra Strength Tylenol. Cigarettes.

Disguises seem like a good idea. They stop in the beauty aisle and examine the hair dye. None of the boxes of color seem right, but Eric grabs a pack of hair ties instead and tosses them to Dylan. It’s the best he can do.

The rain is still falling when they make it back to the car, so they might as well fuck around for a bit. Dylan pulls his hair up into a ponytail after combing through his hair with his long, thin fingers. Eric busts into the bottle of Tylenol, handing two to Dylan after taking two himself.

Simultaneously, they light up a smoke.

“How many miles to Florida, you think?” Dylan asks Eric. He watches people in the grocery store parking lot struggle with their purchases in the rain, trying to maneuver keys and bags and shopping carts.

“Can’t be more than a couple hundred,” Eric reasons. How far had they come already? Too far, but at the same time, not far enough. Nobody was keeping track.

“Kind of feels like we’re seeing the whole country in a day.”

“There’s something to be said for staying in one place,” Eric shrugs. He ashes his cigarette through a tiny crack in the window.

“You’ve really been all over, huh?” Dylan has nothing to compare it to. He’s lived in the same house his whole life. So he just listens.

Eric runs through the list of all the places he’s lived on his hands. “Kansas, Ohio, Michigan, New York, Littleton.” He shakes his head, disgruntled. “What’s the point in getting close to people when they’re just going to be ripped out of your life?”

“Is that why you were scared of me in middle school?”

“Scared of you?” Eric smirks. “If that’s what you want to call it.”

“You were shy,” Dylan recalls. They both were. He remembers the soccer and the polo shirts and stupid jokes. Those days felt like a lifetime ago.

“Not any more than you, nerd!”

“I’m sorry, man,” Dylan apologizes.

“I swear to God, I wasn’t ‘scared’, Vodka. Jesus.” Eric rolls his eyes.

“That’s not what I’m apologizing for… You want roots. The things we did... we are _always_ going to be runaways,” Dylan expounds, motioning to them, to the car.

“You don’t get it,” Eric laughs. “It doesn’t matter.”

Dylan feels dumb. He wants to get it, wants to understand. He would try, if Eric would let him.

“No,” Eric corrects himself, realizing that his laughter must sound mean, trying to figure out a way to explain when he sees the crestfallen look on his friend’s face. He tosses his cigarette out the window, rolling it back up quickly before too much water can drip inside, and takes a look at Dylan, trying to find a way to say what he meant by it not mattering anymore. “You’re the only person worth sticking around for.” Eric makes a dry heaving noise. “That sounds gay. I mean…” Eric exhales, frustrated, trying to figure out how to say what he means. “You know what I mean, right?” He looks to Dylan, hoping he’ll understand without needing more interpretation.

_Now_ Dylan gets it.

The rain drip, drip, drips to a halt.

*

Together they cross state line after state line. Paranoid and edgy, Eric’s not happy until they put as much distance between themselves and the state of Colorado as possible.

For $30 a night, the Dreamland Motel is impossible to beat, but Eric looks mad when he sees that there’s only one bed in the hotel room. Shaking his head, he’s about to go speak to the hotel clerk when Dylan reaches out and grabs his wrist, keeping him from leaving.

“It’s fine,” Dylan says, defeated, and that’s that. What’s this but one more fucked up thing on this shit-show of a road trip?

Dylan flops onto the bed and mindlessly flips through the television channels, ignoring the news reports. He’s heard his name uttered in every corner of the country; at least it’s always in the same breath as Eric Harris.

Inside the bathroom, Eric draws a hot bath in the tub. He flips the faucet all the way to one side, guaranteeing that the water will be hot enough to scald his skin.

Eric sheds his clothes and sinks under the water. He’s got a bruise on his right shoulder from firing the shotgun a few days ago; he presses a finger into it and winces at the pain. He lets his shoulder slip under the warm water.

Submerged, his body begins to relax for the first time in days. The water is warm and pleasant, lulling him into a sense of security that makes him want to fall asleep. Eric tips his head back on the cool tile and closes his eyes, trying to let the water do its work. It’s been hard to feel clean since that last day of school, though he’d never admit it.

In the middle of Eric’s bath, Dylan wanders shirtless into the tiny bathroom, seemingly oblivious to Eric’s presence. He stares at himself in the mirror for a minute, eyeing himself judgmentally.

Dylan tips the toilet lid down and sits on top of it. He pulls a pack of Marlboro Menthols from his pocket and sticks one between his lips. A flick of his lighter and smoke curls from the tip, rising with each drag of the cigarette.

Eric opens one eye.

Dylan passes Eric his cigarette, which he graciously takes. His wet fingers brush against Dylan’s as they pass the cigarette back and forth. When it’s done, Dylan disappears from the room as quietly as he arrived.

By the time Eric drags himself out of the bathtub and into a clean pair of boxers, Dylan is already curled up in the side of the bed closest to the window. He’s over six feet tall, but Eric’s astonished by the ways he can make himself seem smaller sometimes.

Eric crawls under the covers beside him. He listens to Dylan’s defeated breathing even out into sleep, and it’s only a few brief moments before he joins Dylan in slumber.

*

Morning comes sooner than they’d like. Neither one of them actually moves to get up out of bed when they wake. Instead, Dylan watches Eric in the morning glow, studies the way his eyelashes rest on his cheek, the way his chest rises and falls when he breathes.

Eric’s eyes open and he catches Dylan in the act of staring. He doesn’t hassle him about it, doesn’t give him shit.

It’s surprisingly natural for their mouths to fall together, easy for them to fall into place in each other’s arms. The kiss is slow at first - quiet as the dawn, searching and mellow. It’s the first time they’ve kissed since that day at Columbine.

Dylan seems surer of himself than he did then. Dylan’s fingers trace the shape of Eric’s skull, and his palm cradles Eric’s cheek like it’s something priceless.

Exhausted, they kiss until they can’t hold their heads up and they fall back asleep together, Dylan’s arm thrown over Eric’s waist. They miss check-out time but Dylan can’t summon the will to move. Next to Eric, he feels more rested than he has since the beginning of April.

*

Dylan is making a vending machine cappuccino at a rest stop in the middle of nowhere, Alabama when Eric leans back on the vending machine beside it.

“Babe, we need money.”

Dylan looks up. _Babe_. Eric must want something.

“You know what this means,” Eric tells him, resigned.

Dylan faces his partner with a determined look. If Eric was going to risk his life in another heist, then Dylan could at least contribute his share. “I’m coming with you.”

“Uh-uh, nope, no way,” Eric disagrees. It was too dangerous. They needed to avoid being seen together. Besides, they’ve only got one gun.

“I don’t know what I’d do without you, all right? I’m coming with you,” Dylan repeats. There’s a steely, resolute look in his eyes. If there’s only one reliable way for them to bring in money, Dylan is not letting Eric do this by himself.

Eric knows he’s lost this particular battle. Crossing his arms, he relents. “Fine.”

What’s armed robbery in addition to murder in the first degree?

*

Waiting outside the gas station they’ve decided to knock over, Eric and Dylan are as ready as they’ll ever be.

Dylan runs his hands through his hair nervously.

“Be cool,” Eric murmurs to Dylan. This was nothing, compared to… well.

They storm inside. Eric aims his gun at the Hispanic cashier, pointing the pistol squarely at his face. “Open up the register. _Now_,” he yells.

“Cálmate, por favor,” the cashier starts to say, which only serves to piss Eric off.

“Shut the fuck up! Faster!”

With frightened hands, the clerk obeys him. The cashier empties $660 from the register while Dylan marches through every aisle, filling up a backpack with food and liquor as fast as he can.

“Go start the car,” Eric commands to Dylan when the cashier is almost done, still. He hands the bag of money to Dylan as he passes by, still pointing the gun at the cashier’s face.

When Eric can hear the Oldsmobile idling in front of the door, Eric stalks out of the gas station. Eric hauls himself inside and Dylan peels out of the lot.

“Maybe I should have taken Spanish instead of German,” Eric grins, and Dylan starts laughing.

“Nein! Scheiss.” It was a horrible idea.

Laughing together as fugitives, they feel like Bonnie and Clyde (the fact that one of the duo was a woman be damned). Eric likes having Dylan by his side doing this with him so much that he almost feels bad about turning Dylan down in the first place. There had been an adrenaline rush every time he’d done this on his own, but it’d been even greater with Dylan.

Everything was better with Dylan.

*

Under the cover of nightfall, Eric and Dylan take back roads from Florida’s panhandle all the way down to Pahokee, a tiny, dirt-poor town on the eastern shore of Lake Okeechobee. There’s nothing fucking there, nothing but acres of sugar cane and swamps and bullshit. It feels remote and disconnected. Hidden away in the Everglades, it doesn’t seem like the kind of town anyone’s keeping an eye on.

Dylan thinks he might be able to let his guard down for the first time since bailing out of Colorado. Black asphalt merges with blacker sky, and he feels anonymous in a way that’s been impossible since the day they left Littleton.

They’ve stolen enough money to rent a place by the week at the edge of town - if you can even call Pahokee a town. They get a cheap motel room in an old, lemon-colored building nestled beside a deep cluster of saw palmetto and scrub palms. The faded wallpaper peels in the humidity and the beds look neither comfortable nor clean but this is the first time the two have spent more than one night anywhere since they left Colorado.

Cash goes quick, and Dylan finally convinces Eric that they can’t just rob a convenience store every time they need money - it’s just not wise given how badly they were wanted by the FBI. Dylan won’t admit it, but he’s getting sick of watching Eric disappear with his SIG.

So Eric looks for odd jobs to placate Dylan, taking anything he can get in exchange for a little cash. Nobody wants to hire someone with no valid forms of identification. It limits everything. The first (and only) thing he finds is temporary work doing junk removal, hauling trash and tree limbs before the onset of hurricane season. Eventually Eric figures out he can wait on the side of the road with the migrant workers until a bus comes by to pick them up for construction work. No papers, no questions.

Dylan wishes he’d thought far enough ahead about their great escape to stick a book in his backpack or something. Finding ways to entertain himself while on the run has been harder than he ever imagined. There were only so many daytime episodes of _Maury_ one could watch before going absolutely fucking nuts, and episodes of _Cops_ make him sick to his stomach. He starts ripping pages out of the Gideon Bible in the dresser and folding tiny origami animals from the thin paper.

Dylan flips on the television. The national news comes on and he switches it back off immediately. Dylan’s been avoiding news reports like the plague, even though Eric watches them with a sick fascination. His and Eric’s faces have been slammed on every media outlet since the 20th.

He’s heard enough about what sort of monster he is.

*

A cursory glance at the alarm clock lets Dylan know that it’s almost nine in the morning, although the creeping darkness at the window makes it feel like the middle of the night.

Dylan finds Eric standing outside their motel room, smoking a cigarette and staring up at the sky. The shade of it is alarming - gloomy and black. Clouds loom like shadows overhead. It looks plague-like, a nightmarish hellscape, and Dylan swears it smells like fire - undoubtedly a bad omen.

Dylan finds out later that the black sky is really just sugar cane burning, thousands of acres set alight to keep the soil rich. It’s not the end of the world. It just feels like it.

*

One day Eric doesn’t get up to work, he can’t bear to. His cheeks bear the hint of a sunburn after only a few days of working in the Florida heat. The South in April is already so much hotter than Colorado during this time of year.

Morning gives way to afternoon, and after a lazy day of dozing, Eric and Dylan leave the car parked at the motel and walk over to Lake Okeechobee, the largest lake in Florida, a colossal inland sea. There are no radio stations out here, and they’ve got nothing but time on their hands anyway. “Fuckin’ Florida, man.”

There’s a 35-foot-tall dike around the Big O, one hundred and ten miles of marshy rim where five counties meet in the middle of the state. The water is blue and flat, surrounded by wetlands full of wading birds.

Dylan and Eric start to walk around the trail, heading south toward Torrey Island. A toothless fisherman grins at them from one of the docks.

The wind is strong; it picks up quick and ruffles Dylan’s hair underneath his hat.

Each mile looks exactly the same as the next until they reach an old hand-cranked swing bridge leading to the island.

“Check it out,” Eric says, pointing ahead.

“Looks old as shit,” Dylan remarks.

“Come on,” Eric says, running out onto the one-lane bridge. Recklessly, he climbs up onto the green truss, beyond a NO TRESPASSING sign. He scampers to the top and spreads his arms out, his body a silhouette against the sun. Dylan is reminded of Icarus.

Eric tosses his hat to the ground, peels off his shirt, and kicks his shoes off. Dylan barely has time to ask “The fuck?” before Eric is jumping off the bridge into the water.

Dylan scrambles up to the top to look over the edge. It’s a twelve-foot drop from the top of the bridge into the water. He can see Eric’s body breaking the surface with a huge splash. A second later, Eric pops back up, hollering and waving to Dylan.

Dylan shakes his head, but he’s not going to let Eric go somewhere he can’t follow. He strips his shirt over his head, throwing it aside with his hat and cigarettes, and takes a deep breath before diving over the edge.

Dylan comes up spluttering, kicking and thrashing his arms. His boots weigh him down in the water.

Eric grins with him, treading the murky water and splashing Dylan.

Dylan gives him a taste of his own medicine, pushing water into his face. He knows the other boy will kill him if he tries to push him under the surface. “Ugh,” Eric complains. “This water is disgusting.”

Dylan floats on his back until he uprights himself suddenly with a sobering thought. “Do you think there are alligators down here?”

Eric’s eyes widen. “Abort mission,” he yells. He starts swimming for the shore.

Dylan follows and they drag themselves out of the water.

Soaking wet, they grab their clothes and run away from the bridge-tender, who’s hollering at them from afar. Eventually they find a picnic table where they spread out in the sunshine and laugh. Dylan sits shirtless on the concrete table and stretches his long limbs out in front of him like an anhinga.

Eric reaches for his cigarettes, disappointed when he finds that each one is soaking wet. “Goddamnit.”

Dylan chuckles and offers him one of his own, leaning forward to light it for him, cupping one hand around the end of the cigarette to block the strong wind.

The sunshine feels good on their wet skin; after being cooped up in a car for so many days their muscles appreciate the opportunity to bask in the sunny weather. The two of them stay stretched out under the sun for longer than they realize, bodies perched in just the same way on opposite ends of the picnic table.

“How does Florida live up to your expectations?”

“Less _Jackie Brown_, more Jim Bob. Why? What’s up, Reb?”

“No reason.”

“So what’s the plan?” Dylan asks Eric. It’s a big question.

“Walk back to the motel? Grab something to eat?”

“No. You know what I mean.” Dylan doesn’t mean the plan for tonight. He means… _the plan_.

Eric purses his lips. Dylan worries. It’s what he does.

“Do you think we fucked up? Do you think we should have gone to Mexico instead of Miami?”

“This is new territory, man, I don’t know. We’re not even there yet,” Eric shrugs. “I know we’re making this up as we go along but what the fuck else are we supposed to do?” Eric balks. His gaze falls on Dylan, on the long line of his slender body stretched out on the stone picnic table. The way he’s resting on his elbows, legs straight out in front of him pointing at the lake, makes his lanky body seem even longer.

The lake and the sky mirror each other the same way the boys do. The clouds make crystal-clear reflections in the brilliant blue water, and it’s truly something to see.

Eric turns to look back at Dylan instead of at the view.

Dylan puts his hands up. “I don’t expect you to have all the answers.” Dylan meets his gaze. “Doesn’t mean I'm not gonna ask you anyway,” he says with a soft smile.

“Okay,” he replies, satisfied, like maybe he thought that Dylan actually _did_ expect him to have all the answers. “Okay.”

Daylight fades and the sun begins to set over the lake, the dazzling Floridian sunset more spectacular than any other they’d seen on their cross-country travels. Tangerine mixes with cotton-candy pink in luscious swirls across the crepuscular sky until all the color slowly fades away.

It’s dark by the time they practically crawl back to their motel room, but somehow they’ve managed to let off some much-needed steam.

*

The events of April 20 seem to haunt them both, in different ways.

“I hate that picture,” Dylan says, after seeing a 10th grade photograph of himself while Eric’s flipping through the three weak channels on the television set. “I look so ugly.” Dylan avoids it all, but sometimes Eric seeks out the press just to gauge their status. While it was widely reported that they had escaped Littleton, nobody really seemed to know where they were at. There were more than a few speculations; one report had them spotted in the Pacific Northwest, yet another placing them in Texas heading for the border.

Eric is all too aware that the pressure of this new life is getting to Dylan, although he can’t tell what’s worse for him, the way he feels about that day or the demands of running from the law. Every second, every decision is the difference between them getting caught.

Dylan starts getting these nightmares, thrashing, kicking, proper nightmares. Always late at night, always in the wee hours of the morning just after Eric’s finally managed to convince his racing brain to shut off, postponing the whole affair of sleep yet again. There’s been more than one night when just after Eric’s managed to nod off, he’s awoken again by groans or whimpers and the sound of Dylan rolling around in bed.

Eric never sure if he should wake Dylan up, he’s never sure about any of this. So he listens. When the nightmares keep on without stopping… he talks. Who knows if Dylan can hear him or not?

”I’m here, man, I’m right here,” Eric whispers. ”You’re gonna be okay.” Eric listens for Dylan’s movements, the sound of his voice. Dylan’s bed creaks. Eric can hear him turn over and reach for a pillow, though awake or asleep, Eric doesn’t know.

One bad night, the sound of Dylan’s whimpers become more like shrieks. “I’m gonna need you to man the fuck up now, Dylan,” Eric tells him. The last thing they need is to be kicked out of a motel room they’ve already paid for. It’s not like he’s not sympathetic. He is. He was there. He saw the same shit Dylan saw. But there is no point in letting this run their lives. “Don’t make me come over there,” Eric threatens when the noise keeps up.

Dylan’s hollers keep up, and Eric slips out of bed and kneels beside Dylan on the ratty carpet. Despite being asleep, his face is tense, drawn. He looks older and unhappy as he holds back whimpers.

Eric’s got no idea where to start. It’s a little embarrassing. He’s never done anything like this before. He puts a hand on Dylan’s chest, nudging him until his eyes blink open. He looks disoriented. Eric can feel him take a shaky breath, moving underneath his hand.

“Eric?” Dylan asks, trying to figure out what Eric’s doing in front of him.

“You were having a nightmare,” Eric explains. His hand is still on Dylan’s chest. “You gotta let some of that shit go. Leave the mission behind you,” he instructs Dylan. “It’s over now.”

“I’m going crazy,” Dylan whispers, blinking at the ceiling.

Feeling like he’s been too uncharacteristically maudlin already, Eric’s only response to that sentiment is “Quit your bitchin’.”

It frustrates Dylan at first, but the next day Eric comes back to their motel room with a blank composition book from the dollar store for him. Dylan goes speechless at the gesture, dragging his fingernail down the spine.

Eric smirks, proud. “I told you. I’ve got your back.”

*

Just because the massacre is in their past doesn’t mean the melancholy is.

Eric trudges in to the motel room after dark every day, exhausted. Dylan feels how Eric looks, but at least he sleeps the mornings away after Eric’s been chasing whatever odd job he can.

One bleak day Eric finds him sitting on the edge of the bed, cradling Eric’s stainless steel pistol in his hands.

“We should have killed ourselves.”

While their original plan for NBK had been to kill themselves at the school, they’d reconsidered after realizing how godlike they actually were. Maybe things could be different. A few weeks before the massacre, Dylan began dreaming of a long highway. Eric took it as a sign and decided death wasn’t going to split them apart.

Eric kneels in front of Dylan and carefully pries the gun from his grasp. “We did not bust the fuck outta Columbine just to give up the minute we got away.”

“I don’t know if I can do this,” Dylan stammers, unable to look Eric in the eye.

Eric shakes his head. “We don’t have a choice.” He grabs Dylan’s hand. “Hey.”

“I’m fine,” Dylan swears, looking him in the eye.

All of it was getting to Dylan, although sometimes Eric wasn’t sure if it was the crime, the escape, or simply one of Dylan’s moods. The two of them find different ways of coping with it all. Eric takes hot shower after hot shower to occupy his time. Dylan, on the other hand, depressed and dispirited, stops bathing altogether.

Eric gets fed up that night after his stunt and practically manhandles him into the shower.

“I promise you will feel better,” Eric swears. He hopes like hell it’s true. “Wash your fucking hair,” he shouts behind him before closing the bathroom door.

When Dylan emerges from the bathroom half an hour later, he looks better than he has in days. He smells like soap, has on a clean t-shirt, and his hair, while not combed, is freshly washed.

Dylan sinks onto the bed, spreads his skinny limbs out and closes his eyes. He takes deep, even breaths. He looks like he could even fall asleep. 

Eric eyes him as he sags into the covers. He’s glad it fucking worked. Dylan has been edgy lately, morbid and morose. Eric hadn’t realized that he would need to spend so much time looking out for Dylan, but as he’d been reminded, all they had was each other. That meant relying on one another and if it also meant making sure Dylan didn’t fall apart on his watch - so be it.

*

It’s a sticky, humid Friday night, although the days of the week seem relatively meaningless to Dylan and Eric now.

Eric pulls the Oldsmobile into a drive-in restaurant the next town over. It’s old and looks suspicious - but it’s not a fucking motel room. Eric just wants to do something fun for a change. He orders them both milkshakes. It might be out of their budget, but it’s been easy to save money when Dylan won't eat anything.

The waitress is on rollerskates, an old school touch that Eric sneers at, but she’s in cute Daisy Dukes that reveal her tanned, muscled thighs. Eric forks over six dollars in quarters, but the waitress looks past him to Dylan in the passenger seat. She stares for just a moment too long - enough to make him uneasy. Eric leans forward to disrupt her gaze, inserting his head in between their faces. “Thank you,” he says to her with a smirk, rolling up the car window in her face before she can get another glance at Dylan.

Eric doesn’t think about fucking her once, not even as she skates away, perfect ass bouncing as she glides from toe to toe. Instead he unwraps a straw for Dylan, plops it in his shake and hands it to him with a look that says if he doesn’t drink it, he’ll kill him. _Please let him eat it_, Eric prays silently anyway. Dylan’s always been skinny but he’s dropped another five pounds since the shooting, worry - among other things - gnawing away at him.

Eric notices that Dylan’s still wearing his favorite earring in his left ear, the highly distinctive three-barred cross. “Shit,” he curses. “Give me your earring, V.” He holds his hand out, palm facing up.

“No!”

Eric pleads with a look.

Disappointed, Dylan obeys, reaching up and unfastening his earring, dropping it into Eric’s palm.

Eric stares at the earring for a moment before slipping it in his pocket. It was stupid of them to have missed a detail like that one.

“Did you know the CIA tried to kill Fidel Castro with a poisoned milkshake in 1963?”

Eric can’t get enough of Dylan’s weird trivia. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. And that wasn’t the weirdest time? They actually tried to assassinate him with an exploding cigar. Castro was a diver, too, so the CIA tried rigging a mollusk shell with explosives and infecting a diving suit with a skin disease.”

“Wicked,” Eric laughs. “None of that shit worked though.”

“He’s still ticking!”

“Motherfucker is going to live to be like, a hundred, wait and see.”

Eric is satisfied when he sees Dylan slurp at the chocolate shake as they joke with each other. It might not be a real meal but it feels like progress. The milkshakes are a sweet relief from the heat.

“You know who else I bet lives for-fuckin’-ever? D.B. Cooper.”

“I guess we’ll never know.”

“Talk about motherfucking legends,” Eric comments. “Two hundred thou. What would you buy?”

“I don’t think I’d buy anything,” Dylan answers, after considering it for a moment. “I think I’d go somewhere.”

“Like a vacation?”

Dylan shakes his head. “Leave forever. Find some beautiful somewhere and never look back.”

Eric nods, like he can get behind the idea. He’s thought about all the rifles he could buy with $200k, all of the cool gadgets. “Where would you go?”

Dylan thinks it over. “Bali.”

“_Bali_? What’s in Bali?”

“Food, culture, volcanoes… Not a single person that I know or recognize for thousands of miles.” Dylan takes a slurp. “The water is clear enough you can see through it. The exchange rate is so wild you could get a little house on the beach cheaper than you can live in Littleton.”

It sounds cool. Eric’s never really considered Asia before, but thinking of it now - thinking of Littleton, of Mexico, Florida, Bali, Hell, anywhere - he just doesn’t want to fucking bother unless Dylan is there.

“Is there room for me?” Eric asks like a dumbass, even though Dylan literally just said he wanted to be alone.

Dylan smiles into his milkshake at his question. He nods yes. _Duh_.

Dylan thanks him shyly before they drive away, which is excessively polite and completely unnecessary, but Eric hopes maybe he’s done something right for once in his short existence. Neither Eric nor Dylan mentions Columbine nor being on the run one single time. For half an hour, hanging out in a car on a Friday night, Eric Harris is a normal fucking kid again.

*

Life on the run is not quite what Dylan or Eric expects; it’s nothing close to what the movies depict. The life and death thrill is there, sure, but they’re not really living like the Gecko brothers or like Mickey and Mallory. Things are more boring than Dylan had predicted, certainly. Hiding out, laying wait… there wasn’t always much to do. They talk, sometimes, but Dylan constantly finds himself looking to fill the time where Eric _won’t_ have anything to do with him. Stressed out, he gets into pissy moods where he keeps to himself and won’t let Dylan in on anything he’s thinking.

Sometimes Dylan feels like they’re in some weird limbo. They’ve kissed a couple of times now, but it’s gone completely unmentioned, and that’s all there ever is. Is it Eric blowing off steam or something else? Dylan has no idea.

Tonight, Eric is sitting cross-legged on the bed, watching some shitty documentary on killers on the television. Dylan recognizes the tension in the hard line of his shoulders and his hunched posture.

Dylan reaches his hand out and slips it onto the nape of Eric’s neck. He rubs his thumb against the knobs of Eric’s spine, a soothing, calming motion.

Eric leans into his touch, so Dylan continues, a little astonished that Eric doesn’t push his hand away. If this is the only comfort he can bring him, so be it. Dylan sweeps his fingers across Eric’s skin in a soothing pattern. Eric’s shoulders droop a little and the tension starts to fade away.

To Dylan’s amazement, Eric flops down sideways on the bed to keep watching the program, resting his head in Dylan’s lap instead of a pillow. Dylan watches Eric instead of the documentary. He did a paper on Manson for school; he was already familiar with the basics. What he craves more than entertainment is closeness and connection. Whatever he’s doing to Eric is actually relaxing for him, too, so he keeps it up until the credits roll, massaging the skin at the back of his neck and feeling the pressure dissipate under his hand.

Before the moment can end, Dylan studies Eric’s face and decides _fuck it_. He bends over and presses their lips together in an upside-down kiss. Dylan has only been kissed twice in his young life, making this the third - and it’s fucking sexy.

Dylan’s upper lip brushes against Eric’s bottom lip. His eyes close when Eric opens his mouth under his, feeling his tongue glide against his own. The kiss - though upside-down - is so slow and warm and perfect that Dylan doesn’t want it to end. The moment is electric. Dylan feels more alive than he has in years.

He doesn’t want to ever let go, although he has to, just so he can breathe. Eric hesitates a moment, then switches off the television, making the room painfully silent. Eric gets up to double-check the lock on the door and turn off the light. The only trace of light in the room comes from the yellow glow of the streetlight peeking through the crack at the bottom of the door.

To Dylan, Eric’s brief series of actions feel like they take years, but they find each other in the dark. They will always know how to find each other in the dark.

Dylan is sitting on the edge of the bed, unable to lie back and wait. Their knees jostle when Eric reaches for Dylan. Eric steps between his legs and nudges his knees a little further apart so he can move closer.

This time, there’s fire behind the embrace. Hidden together in the shadows, their hands are all over each other, lips brushing, tongues meeting for the first time.

Dylan has always dreamed of love - finding a soulmate, a match, someone to go down with. He’s dreamed of love like Mickey and Mallory’s - and while maybe it had crossed his mind that it would be so sweet to be that way with Eric, the ultimate conclusion to NBK, he’d never thought it could actually happen. He never thought they could really have this.

Their mouths open together. Eric’s mouth on his feels… right. He feels so much less alone. Dylan’s been so fucking lonely - he’s been with Eric this whole time, but sometimes he still feels like he’s on his own. It feels so good to really be with Eric, to touch him, hold him, move with him.

The best thing about Eric’s attention is that when it’s on you, that’s all there is. Eric’s focus comes with a single-minded obsession.

Dylan slips his hand under Eric’s shirt, pressing his fingers against the warm skin above Eric’s boxers. His fingers stroke him lazily.

“Reb —”

“Don’t talk,” Eric says, pressing his mouth to Dylan’s again.

They wind up sprawled on top of the covers, Dylan’s lanky body folded over Eric’s. Dylan is immediately taken with the feeling of Eric’s body underneath his. He’s smaller than Dylan - not small like a girl, but small enough where Dylan feels big above him, like he’s cradling Eric’s body with his own. It feels good to be close to someone like this, intimate. Even better that it’s Eric. It’s truly the logical fulfillment of NBK.

As Eric opens up underneath him, Dylan thinks there’d nobody he’d rather be with right now, which is funny because there would never be anyone else again. From now until the end of time, it would just be him and Reb against the world.

Dylan feels a sudden burst of affection toward Eric, and runs his palm across Eric’s cropped hair.

They kiss and keep kissing - gone are the tired, desperate kisses they’ve shared in the past, fueled by the moment. This embrace is full of fire, life, energy. It’s about something more than just sharing closeness. Dylan wants it all.

Eric’s hands come up to rest on Dylan’s bony hips. Dylan can feel his fingertips tracing little circles against his side. It’s sweet.

Eric’s heartbeat pounds in time with Dylan’s - fast, unrepentant. The kiss grows even more heated.

Eric wants rid of Dylan’s t-shirt, so he tugs at it until Dylan gets the point. Eric helps him pull it over his head, and then his own is the next to go. Finally their skin is touching, sweet, blessed heat, everything Dylan never knew he needed.

Eric, wild as ever, flips them around again so he can straddle Dylan. He kisses Dylan’s chest, his angular collarbone, then mouths a kiss on Dylan’s neck, sucking a hickey into the skin.

“C’mere,” Dylan whispers, and then they’re pressed chest-to-chest, bodies moving against each other. Dylan kisses him again, savoring the taste, learning what it means to be wanted.

Eric shifts against Dylan with a groan. Their cocks brush underneath the fabric of their boxers, and a shudder runs up Eric’s spine. He moves again, deliberately this time, grinding their erections together. Both of them are hard, fuck.

They thrust their hips together; Dylan clutches at Eric’s back and Eric grinds down on Dylan as heat builds between their bodies. The pressure is sensational. Dylan sighs, wanton, when their cocks rub against each other even through their clothes, hot flesh buzzing.

“Please tell me we’re gonna fuck,” Eric whimpers.

Dylan nods his head - because _yes, they are going to do this_ \- and then they’re kissing again, messy and wet. Breathing heavy, they make out for a few minutes before going for the inevitable.

Dylan’s long cock pokes out of his boxers and Eric takes him in hand, smearing the precome on Dylan’s cock with his thumb.

Eric slowly tucks his fingers into the waistband of Dylan’s green plaid boxers and pulls them down. He presses kisses to Dylan’s sharp hipbones and the pale skin just beneath his bellybutton. Dylan shivers when he kisses the short scar on his abdomen.

“I’ve never done this before,” Eric gives a disclaimer. He licks his lips.

“I’m sure you’ll be —”

Before Dylan can finish his sentence, Eric’s mouth is on his cock, lips moving across the spongy head. Dylan’s cock gives an interested twitch at the touch of Eric’s tongue. His tongue runs across the slit before he tries to take him down. Unable to control his spit, he uses a little too much teeth, but what he lacks in talent he makes up for in enthusiasm, gripping Dylan at the base and working his tongue across the head of his penis.

“You taste like my dick,” Dylan grins after a naughty kiss, and Eric shoves him.

“Shut up,” he says, but kisses him again fondly. He slides his hand over Dylan’s erection, over his balls, and then even lower. While sliding a tongue into Dylan’s mouth he simultaneously presses a finger to Dylan’s opening.

Dylan’s never done anything like this before - Eric is sure of it - so Eric watches his face like a hawk, taking in everything. Nobody’s done this to Dylan before, made him feel this way, look this way.

Eric slides his finger inside Dylan. He curls his finger, watching color bloom on Dylan’s cheeks. Dylan doesn’t resist and so Eric fingers him slowly, adding another finger when one doesn’t seem like enough. He looks down at his own dick to compare it to two fingers and decides he should probably add a third.

Dylan moans when Eric gets a third finger inside him, and Eric thinks he could probably get him off like this if he didn’t want to get his dick wet. Fuck it, he was _so hard_, and he wanted to lose his virginity. This was the only thing left for the two of them, anyway.

Eric nudges Dylan’s bony knees further apart so he can crawl between them. He hesitates for just a second before pressing into Dylan. It feels strange at first but then he’s inside him, his cock stretching him out and filling him up.

Dylan’s eyes flutter shut. Eric’s never seen that look on Dylan’s face before. Before moving, he runs a hand up his side, trailing his fingers over Dylan’s ribs. “You good?”

Dylan nods ardently, reaching for Eric, and they move together.

Eric thrusts into Dylan, picking up his pace. He drives deeper inside Dylan, moving his hips harder and faster. Dylan feels so damned good around him, he’s unbelievable.

Dylan pulls their bodies closer together, his long arms keeping Eric’s body pressed against his own. He keeps demanding kisses from Eric, taking his fill while Eric is more than willing to give.

Eric changes his angle and presses deep inside Dylan. Dylan is tight and warm and Eric has to take a second to catch his breath, losing control at the way it feels to be buried inside him.

Dylan groans, grasping at Eric’s hips. As Eric begins to move again, he starts to babble incoherently. Eric’s always thought of Dylan as mouthy, and in bed he’s no different. He might be shy but he’s so damn responsive to everything Eric is doing to him. It feels like the natural extension of their relationship, of whatever they are. Why’d they wait so long to do this?

“Is that good?” Eric asks, kissing his neck.

“Don’t stop,” Dylan begs. “_Don’t stop_,” he repeats mindlessly, clutching at Eric. His hands drift across Eric’s shoulders.

Eric swallows the noises that Dylan is making. Dylan moans into his open mouth and Eric bites Dylan’s lower lip, teasing him but thrusting at the same torturous pace.

Dylan hooks a leg around Eric’s back, tries to pull him closer. They grind together, hands all over each other, tugging, teasing, their appetites for lust becoming living things.

Eric makes sure that Dylan comes first (easy to do with kisses on his neck that turn him into Jell-O), jerking him off and fucking him through his orgasm.

“That’s it, V, fuck,” Eric groans, watching Dylan spill over his hand. Dylan’s nails dig little crescents in Eric’s side.

It doesn’t take Eric much longer, and he sees white when he reaches his own climax, one hand fisted in Dylan’s hair as he pounds into Dylan and releases his come inside him.

Eric doesn’t want to move after he comes, staying draped over Dylan’s tall body.

Eventually, though, he props his chin up. He runs a finger across Dylan’s pale back. “I want a cigarette.”

“Get me a Dr. Pepper from the vending machine?” Dylan begs hopefully, too numb to move.

“I guess I could,” Eric teases, pretending it’s a hassle. “Don’t go anywhere.”

Eric gives him another tempting kiss, and Dylan’s toes curl. Perfectly content in this moment, Dylan thinks he could get used to this. He resists pulling Eric right back into his arms, watching as Eric bends over and steps back into his pants. Eric flips him off with a wink when he catches him checking out his ass.

Eric returns to the bed and presses a kiss low at the center of Dylan’s back, working his way up his spine.

“Eric,” Dylan says abruptly, overwhelmed with emotion. He wants to tell Eric what he means to him, what NBK means to him. But he already knows, doesn’t he? Eric will probably just tell him to stop being emotional. It doesn’t benefit anyone. So he holds his tongue.

“What’s up, V?”

“Nothing,” Dylan insists.

One more kiss and he grudgingly lets Eric go. Jeans slung low on his hips, Eric disappears out the door with a cigarette dangling between his lips and a dollar bill in his hand.

Five minutes pass, and then ten. After a solid fifteen minutes, Dylan’s curiosity gets the better of him and he pulls his jeans back on over his naked hips to check on his… to check on Eric.

Dylan moves the curtain to peer out the window.

His heart sinks.

Blue and red lights illuminate the parking lot. There are two cop cars parked behind Eric and Dylan’s Oldsmobile. Beyond the car, Dylan sees Eric on his knees, hands in the air above his head. A can of Dr. Pepper is on the ground at his side.

An officer is pointing a gun at the back of Eric’s head.

A second officer appears at the window, gun drawn, and Dylan drops the curtain.

_Fuck_, Dylan thinks. “Fuck!” Agitated, he runs a hand through his hair. He tries to think fast, as panic sets in faster. He runs for Eric’s backpack, digging his hand deep inside to retrieve Eric’s SIG. He’s not going to let this happen to them, to Eric. He loads the gun with trembling hands.

Stalking out of the motel room, Dylan shoots the first officer twice in the chest. The officer falls to the ground, dead.

Eric seems fazed. As the cop arresting Eric begins to fire at Dylan, Dylan aims at the officer’s face and pulls the trigger. Brains and blood splatter against the back of the squad car.

“Eric,” Dylan calls.

Eric drops his hands and reaches out, trying to get up, trying to explain, but time stops and tunnel vision sets in. Everything is ringing, so loud that Eric doesn’t hear himself say Dylan’s name, doesn’t hear himself over the _crack_ of a bullet coming from the gun of _another_ cop, a third cop, one emerging from the side of the motel.

Everything that happens next feels like it happens in slow motion. The cop’s bullet strikes Dylan’s temple, and he falls to his knees. Dylan slumps to the ground. His head strikes the pavement at such a bizarre angle that Eric knows immediately that it’s over.

“No!” Eric had never heard the sound of his own scream.

Eric tries to crawl forward to Dylan’s body, pulling him toward his lap. Dry throat, hollow eyes, Eric is wrecked. Eric presses a horrified, shaking hand to Dylan’s cheek. His fingers come away red, covered in Dylan’s blood. His blond hair is matted with the scarlet fluid.

Eric traces his cheekbone with a thumb, pressing a hand to his cheek. “_Dyl_—,” he attempts, but the howl gets lost somewhere in his throat anyway.

“Hands in the air where I can see them!” the cop shouts, but Eric ignores him, unable to look away from Dylan’s face.

_It doesn’t matter_, he thinks, _it doesn’t matter now_. Eric can’t stop touching Dylan’s cheek. He’s not breathing. This isn’t the plan. There was never a plan where they weren’t in this together. There was never a plan where they split up, no plan where Dylan left him.

“Hands in the air!”

Eric’s hand trembles. He slides his quivering thumb to Dylan’s eyelid, closes it. Eric observes the length of Dylan’s eyelashes for the first time. There’s nothing about Dylan Klebold that Eric wouldn’t have learned to love. Eric shuts his other eye. It’s the last thing he’ll ever do for Dylan.

“This is your _last warning_!”

Eric’s whole body shakes but he manages to lift his arms up above his head.

The officer hauls Eric up and reads him his Miranda rights. Handcuffs are snapped into place around his wrists and the cop maneuvers him around with a hand on his neck, trying to get him to move toward his car (trying to get him to move without Dylan, who not an hour before was wrapped around him, a part of him, living off of the same air).

“No - don’t - you can’t leave him here, please. Don’t leave him here,” Eric resists; every fibre of his being wants to go to Dylan’s side. Eric should shut up but he can’t stop blathering broken phrases. His face is wet. Why is his face wet? Eric realizes as the cop pushes him into the backseat of a squad car that it’s because tears are rolling down his face. _Stupid_.

Eric stares at Dylan’s lifeless body through the window as the cop radios for backup. Dylan is half-naked on the pavement in a pile of blood and Dr. Pepper. He looks cold.

Eric would have done anything for him but he didn’t have to, did he, because Dylan already did it for him. _I want to kill him for this_, Eric thinks with a strangled sob.

Sirens and flashing lights fill the air. More police cars flood the lot.

Eric closes his eyes for just a second - he’s so damn tired - but the image of Dylan, hurt and unmoving, is burned on the back of his eyelids.

Eric looks out the window, raging at the officer who starts rummaging through Dylan’s body. ”Piece of shit,” he snarls, even though the officer in the car is the one who killed Dylan. Eric bangs his head against the window. “Don’t touch him!” he screams.

His arresting officer glares at him in the rearview mirror like he’s crazy. “Shut your fucking mouth, Klebold,” he tells him, starting the car.

“I’m not…” Eric shakes his head, distressed. _Fuck it._.

Eric stares at Dylan, taking in the way his long, thin limbs are arranged crookedly on the cement, his bony fingers askew in puddles of blood. Not an hour ago Eric’s hands were tangled in that blond hair, blond hair that was now turning red, stained from the sanguine flood seeping from the hole in Dylan’s head.

A hole in his head that wouldn’t be there if it wasn’t for Eric.

The officer drives away from the motel. Eric is unable to look away; slumping against the window, he has no choice but to keep his eyes on Dylan until he’s a tiny speck in the distance that disappears completely and fades into the night. Dylan’s blood is drying on his fingertips as grief tears through his chest.

This is not what he wanted — this was never what he wanted.

_I’m sorry, V_. It’s a silent prayer Eric doesn’t know which way to send, an apology from a man who doesn’t give them, an epithet from a man who doesn’t use them. _I’m so fuckin’ sorry._


End file.
